Lettie Lefever found Hoke St. John dead in the backyard.
She had glanced out the kitchen window as she put the last plate into the drying rack. She thought he looked wrong somehow. He had slumped forward over the steel-jaw trap he’d been repairing, but from Lettie’s angle at the kitchen sink, it looked as if he was still working on it. For a moment she stared at him, waiting to see if he moved.
He didn’t.
She stepped to the back door and looked again, then walked fast across the dirty grass to Hoke, bent down, and touched his upper arm. He crumpled over onto his side, slack-jawed, vacant eyes widened to the glaring Louisiana sun.
Lettie’s own eyes shot to the steel-jaw trap to assure it was not still open, not waiting to crush her hand or foot. Her mind did not register the glance. Hers was a primal act, accomplished without delay of conscious decision.
She reached down and tried to find a pulse on his neck, felt nothing. Satisfied that she would have felt a pulse had there been one, she knelt beside him, raised her head, and stared into the distance, south toward the Gulf.
With Hoke gone, she would need to promote someone—someone she could trust, someone with a steady hand and good judgment. Someone to oversee the distribution end of her affairs, the pair of them far outside the law and answerable only to themselves. She considered her options and found them wanting. Hoke had been dependable, and she had kept him close.
She was lost in thought when her ear caught the sound of footsteps approaching around the side of the house. Her head snapped toward the sound and her eye caught sight of Eddie just as he emerged around the corner. The tension in her shoulders eased as she watched him cross the yard.
“What happened?”
Lettie looked down at Hoke’s collapsed body. “Heart attack, probably. I don’t know.”
Eddie bent down and checked for a pulse. Lettie watched, waited.
Eddie gave it some time to be sure, then stood, reached down and offered a hand to help Lettie to her feet. She took it and let him pull her up.
They walked together back to the house. Inside, she went to the phone, leaving Eddie at the kitchen table.
When she returned, Eddie said, “Looks like he went fast.” She knew Eddie couldn’t have had any idea one way or the other, it was just something people say.
Lettie nodded in recognition of Eddie’s effort rather than in agreement. She sat down at the table across from him and stared into the distance, not wanting to talk about Hoke until she had time to think. Finally, she turned her attention to Eddie. “It’s good to see you. How is your mother?”
“She’s well. Thanks.” Eddie leaned forward, elbows on the table. “Is there anything you need me to do about Hoke?”
Lettie shook her head. “No, I’ve called someone. But thank you for asking.”
“Well …” Eddie hesitated, cautious in choosing the right words to deliver what he knew would be unwelcome news. “… the reason I came, I wanted to let you know that I told my boss to come see you.”
Lettie jerked upright. “What! Why?”
“He has something that belonged to Mr. Stein.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What is it?”
Eddie continued with caution. “No idea. But he wants to make sure whatever it is gets into family hands. He was with Mr. Stein when he died in that highway accident coming down from Memphis.”
She stared at Eddie. “Your boss was with Edgar? I’d thought Edgar was alone.”
“They were waiting for medical help together after the pile-up. Mr. Stein offered him a job in Baltimore.”
“That sounds like Edgar. Hired him to do what, exactly?”
“He’s an analyst.”
“You’re working for an analyst? What does he analyze? I thought you were still working in that bar.”
“I do. He owns the bar. He’s never told me directly, but I’m pretty sure he does cyber security for businesses. If Mr. Stein had a job for him, it must have had to do with that. I don’t know any specifics. Anyway, he just said he wanted to return something of Mr. Stein’s to his family. I told him if he was planning to do that, you would be the one he should speak to.”
Lettie was silent, picturing Edgar Stein trusting his possessions to a stranger and considering the implications of the act. Had Stein trusted this person with his belongings for a reason she would wholeheartedly applaud? Or had he fallen victim to an opportunist now armed with information to be used to her ruin? Finally, she nodded, resigned to the intrusion. “When should I expect him?”
“He’ll be heading out of town in a few days, so he might be in touch tomorrow or the day after.” Eddie paused. “His name’s Gil Willis.” Eddie paused again. “He’s all right.”
Lettie recognized the comment for the appeal that it was. “I’ll talk to him.”
Eddie stood. “It’s too bad about Hoke. What are you going to do?”
Uncharacteristically, she let her frustration show through. “Whatever I damn please,” she snapped.
The next morning, Lettie leaned Hoke’s rifle up next to the front door, a round in the chamber and the safety off. Then she went into the kitchen to clean up. When she heard a car pull into the front yard, she carried the dish towel and the dinner plate she was drying through the living room and through the front door onto the porch.
A tall man who appeared to be in his early fifties, flat stomach, hair going gray stepped out of the car and walked toward her across the yard. From his demeanor, she took him for a man who had prospered by his own hand. As he walked, she caught a shift in his eyes toward her truck parked beside the house. The look was brief, but it lasted long enough to suggest he had been trained to awareness of his surroundings, and she reconsidered the nature of his presence in her yard. She took the towel and plate in her right hand and rested her left hand against the side of the door frame, inches from Hoke’s gun. She recognized the action after the fact. It had been a primal act, accomplished without delay of conscious decision.
Considering her options, she stood quiet in the Delta heat, far outside the law and answerable to no one other than herself.
Gil Willis chose to stop a courteous distance from the porch, hands showing empty. He had not told Eddie that the property he meant to return to Stein’s family consisted of a ring of keys, nor had he shared that he hoped Lettie would let slip what the keys were for.
Gil had found Lettie’s home by following instructions Eddie had given him. The first part of the trip had been easy enough, out across Pontchartrain and make some turns and then, eventually, keep going straight. The drive was pleasant enough, and the traffic light enough, that at times his was the only car on the road. He turned off when he was supposed to, and it was still a good road, no traffic. Turned off again into a different sort of setting, narrower road, houses mostly worn down from years of simply being there, yards showing clumps of weeds interspersed with patches of bare ground and raggedy areas of grass. Metal lawn chairs out in the sun.
Lettie Lefever’s was of that mold. Rock music played somewhere in the house. The song ended and he heard the call letters of an oldies radio station.
She was a hard-looking woman. Deep furrows ran through her sunbaked skin. Her gaunt figure stood tall, unbowed by age and whatever hardships had shaped her.
She stood on the low porch, just outside the doorway, left foot slightly back, carrying her weight. Positioned, he thought, to pivot left, reach back. The stance suggested a weapon leaning up just inside the door where she could reach back and pull it around into view, ready to fire. She didn’t. Pull one out. But he had that sort of feeling, and he respected it.
She was prosperous. The house and yard were common enough, but Lettie was better tended, nice dress, styled hair, good shoes. The vehicle in the car port was an expensive pickup, shiny clean and good tires.
She held a dinner plate in one hand and a dish towel in the other. She dried the plate as she watched him walk across the lawn toward the house, then switched the plate and towel to her right hand. Her left hand found the door frame. He expected bugs to jump in the hot weeds, but none did. Nothing other than Lettie moved at all.
She said, “Mr. Willis.”
He smiled acknowledgement. “Mrs. Lefever?”
She returned the smile as if making a decision, stepped forward. “Lettie.”
When he got to the porch, she put him in a chair back out of the sun and stood beside a matching one. “You were with Edgar when he passed. I’m glad you’ve come.” She rested her hand on the back of the other porch chair. “Can I offer you something to drink?”
“That would be great. Thank you.”
She went into the house and returned with tea, ice cubes clinking in the glasses, napkins wrapped around the bottoms already soaking up condensation. “Did you have any trouble finding this place?”
“None at all.”
She sat down next to him. “Tell me about the accident. I know about it generally. The police came out to let us know and told us he was in a big pile-up.”
He turned toward her in his chair, kept it simple. “I received a head injury and my memory of the whole thing still isn’t clear. I was driving home from Memphis. The traffic wasn’t particularly bad. A tractor-trailer went sideways and started the pile-up.”
“I heard that, too. The police speculated the driver fell asleep. Too long on the road.”
He looked down at the glass in his hand. “My van slammed into the guy ahead of me, then someone slammed into me from behind. I got knocked around pretty hard and I think I passed out. When I came to and pulled myself out of my van, I walked along the line of cars. Someone made me sit down on the grass. Mr. Stein was sitting there, too.”
“Did he say anything about family at the end?”
Gil wanted to avoid disclosing all of his conversation with Stein and had anticipated a question more difficult to step around, but with Lettie’s focus on family, a partly truthful response was easy. “No. Nothing all that personal. He did tell me about his company in Baltimore.” Lettie nodded, didn’t seem inclined to push. He added, “I do analysis and it seemed I might be useful to his company. He impressed me as a decent man.”
Lettie said, “I’m glad you’ve come. I didn’t know anyone had been with him at the end. It wasn’t mentioned anywhere, so far as I know. But that isn’t odd, I suppose. You live in New Orleans?”
“Yes, Ma’am, I do.” They sat in silence, sipping the cool tea.
She asked, “How did your people fare during the storm?”
The storm always meant Katrina. “A friend of mine lost her home. But everyone else I know came through it.”
“That’s good to hear.”
“Before he died, Mr. Stein gave me his keys.” He fished the ring from his pocket and held it out to her. “I wanted to make sure these got passed along to his family.”
Lettie pushed back the sudden muscle tension that crossed her face, but not before her startled response told him the keys mattered. He held that thought, waited for more. She took them from his hand. He watched carefully as she isolated one and turned it to catch the light, then tightened her fingers around it and lowered the ring to her lap. Second key down from the embossed face of the leather fob. He made a mental note, remembering the duplicate set he’d examine when he returned home.
He waited, hoping for a response that might offer some clue as to the key’s purpose. He had considered a secret room or lock box or maybe the key fit something at Stein’s Louisiana home. Perhaps there might have been something in the trunk of Stein’s vehicle that he had intended for Gil to retrieve if he died.
Lettie ‘s head raised; her eyes fixed on Gil’s face. “Do you know why he gave you these?”
“No, I don’t. I’ve thought about that question many times since the accident, but I don’t have a good explanation.” Gil stopped, his mind exploring back into the fog of his memory. “At the time, I thought he might have believed me to be a priest. I don’t know why, but I had that sense.”
“A priest,” Lettie repeated.
“Even if I were a priest, I don’t know why you’d give a priest your keys. It never made sense to me.”
“A priest. Yes. Edgar would trust a priest. And did he ask you to do anything for him?”
No memory emerged. Had Stein whispered, “Hide these,” as he handed Gil his keys? Had Stein pleaded, “Keep them safe. Don’t let anyone know you have them?” Had he spoken as if giving an order? Gil’s memory captured Stein’s voice but not the words. Lettie’s face told him nothing.
She went on as if they were working out a puzzle together. “Can you think why he took you for a priest?” She turned half toward him with the deep green foliage behind her hiding more deep green foliage in the distance.
“He knew he was hurt and might die. So perhaps he wanted me to be a priest.”
“Did he confess to you, then?” She delivered her question in a flat, calm voice, but Gil sensed threat if she discovered Stein had disclosed too much.
“He told me something that might have been a confession. He told me he had treated an employee unfairly, and I believe he regretted it.” Stein had said “poorly” rather than “unfairly,” but Gil’s mind insisted on “unfairly,” and he left it alone. The insistence on fairness was a sudden insight into who Stein was, and Gil was certain he was right.
Lettie’s face suggested neither surprise nor dismay that Stein might have been unfair. Encouraged, Gil shared a further thought. “But for just a moment, I’d had the feeling that perhaps he actually didn’t. Regret it.” That was true, but Gil was shocked at the possibility his words might have offended her and tried to walk it back. “My mind was a blur then, so I’m sure he did. Regret it.” This woman was the first person he had encountered who had known Stein other than professionally. His need to seek answers or, perhaps, to unburden, was so overwhelming he found it difficult to concentrate.
Lettie said, “No, you were likely right to think that. And, yes, he had acted unfairly.”
They sat without speaking for a while. At last, Lettie broke the silence. “Thank you for Edgar’s keys. I appreciate your bringing them yourself. It was an honorable thing to do.”
“You’re more than welcome.” Their conversation was easier now, less strained. “I had to come back to New Orleans to take care of some affairs of my own. My memory had gotten better, so I thought to use the opportunity. Mr. Stein seemed to be a man of character, and our meeting led me to Baltimore. I’m enjoying my work in his company and learned about the gift he gave to a college here. As I understand it, he funded a number of projects at colleges.
“Hillings-Rachlin. When I was small, Edgar used to sit here in the front room and read. He and his parents lived farther on, but he used to get a ride to college from here, so he’d walk to our house in the morning and read and wait. I was only three or four, but my job was to stand watch outside, then run in to tell him when the ride was coming so he could go out to the road.”
Sometimes when you sit quietly for a while, luck kicks in. They had come to a comfortable place.
Gil said, “So Mr. Stein did well at Hillings-Rachlin?”
“Yes. He got a scholarship. Everyone was so proud.”
“I drove out to see the Science Center there,” Gil offered.
Absently, “Did they give you the tour?”
“Yes, they did. It’s very impressive.”
“It is. As you said, Edgar gave money to a lot of colleges, but Hilling-Rachlin was special to him. He never forgot his roots.” Lettie’s eyes focused into the distance. Gil sensed her thoughts had begun to wander elsewhere. Her next words were unexpected. “I tell you what we’ll do, perhaps you’d like to see the rest, what people don’t see on the tour. If you come back, I might could show you around. I work in that building.”
Stunned, his mind raced through the implications of this woman working at Hillings-Rachlin. He couldn’t imagine her in that setting. “I’d like that very much,” he managed. Her face showed thoughtful now, and he wondered why. She was almost ignoring him, as if her thoughts had turned inward, seeking resolution to some problem greater than the momentary intrusion of a stranger.
Anticipating closure, he shifted in his chair. “Thank you for talking with me. I’m glad I had a chance to learn more about Mr. Stein.”
They rose and stood together on her shaded porch. He began thinking of the drive back, welcoming the time alone to make sense of this new window into Stein and his affairs.
Lettie stepped close. “Thank you for telling me about the accident. It helps to know someone was with him when he died.” She held his eyes. “I’m glad it was you. And thank you again for bringing Edgar’s keys.”
“My pleasure.” He might have simply stepped down from the porch and made his way across the lawn to his car. But without thinking, he added, “It sounds as if they might have been important.”
Her reply came so casually he wondered at first whether she was even aware she had said it. Then he saw her face and knew she had spoken with intent. “Only one of them. The one we couldn’t account for. It opens a door at the Science Center.”
Gil could guess that the lock had been changed when the key went missing. So why a need to account for it?
Perhaps she simply wanted to know who had taken it—wanted to find out who might have known it was worth having.
And why make a point of telling him?
Far outside the law and answerable only to herself, Lettie watched Gil walk to his car, considering her decision to keep him close. She understood how Stein might have drawn Gil in—treating him as a priest or, equally likely, believing he really was one. For whatever reason, Stein had made use of him. She could ill afford to be excluded from knowledge of whatever Stein, in his dying, had chosen to set afoot. If anything at all of what Gil Willis had told her were true, she wanted to be his confidante. She had committed herself by telling him about the key. With the gap left by Hoke’s death, she wondered whether Gil Willis would prove to be a threat or an opportunity.